Degrees of separation for handling communications

ABSTRACT

A sender&#39;s degrees of separation from a recipient may be used to aid in spam filtering or to otherwise handle a communication. The “degrees of separation” represent a metric used to quantify whether/how the recipient is linked to the sender through intermediary people or other entities. For example, a recipient may know a first user (first degree of separation) and the first user may know a second user (second degree of separation) who knows the sender of an e-mail. In this case, the sender is separated from the recipient by two degrees of separation (by two other contacts). A level of “trust” or “legitimacy” about a sender&#39;s communication can be inferred by looking at whether the sender is linked to an intended recipient. Typically, user contact lists (e.g., address book, buddy list, and/or white list) are evaluated to determine the number of degrees (or hops) are required to link or relate two users.

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a continuation of U.S. Application Ser. No.10/746,230, filed on Dec. 29, 2003 (now allowed), now U.S. Pat. No.7,945,674 which claims priority to U.S. Provisional Application No.60/459,272, filed on Apr. 2, 2003. The contents of the aboveapplications are expressly incorporated herein by reference in theirentireties.

TECHNICAL FIELD

This description relates to handling communications.

BACKGROUND

With the advent of the Internet and a decline in computer prices, manypeople are communicating with one another through computersinterconnected by networks. A number of different communication mediumshave been developed to facilitate such communications. One prolificcommunication medium is electronic mail (e-mail).

Unfortunately, because the costs of sending e-mail are relatively low,e-mail recipients are being subjected to mass, unsolicited, commerciale-mailings (colloquially known as e-mail spam or spam e-mail). These areakin to junk mail sent through the postal service. However, because spame-mail requires neither paper nor postage, the costs incurred by thesender of spam e-mail are quite low when compared to the costs incurredby conventional junk mail senders. Due to this and other factors, asignificant amount of spam e-mail is sent to e-mail users on a dailybasis.

Spam e-mail impacts both e-mail users and e-mail providers. For ane-mail user, spam e-mail can be disruptive, annoying, and timeconsuming. For an e-mail service provider, spam e-mail representstangible costs in terms of storage and bandwidth usage. These costs maybe substantial when large numbers of spam e-mails are sent.

SUMMARY

In one aspect, techniques for handling a communication from a sender toan intended recipient are described. A communication from a senderdirected to an intended recipient is received. The sender and intendedrecipient of the communication are identified. Whether the sender andthe intended recipient are linked by less than a threshold number ofdegrees of separation is determined. An interface is displayed to thesender prior to displaying the communication to the sender when thesender and the intended recipient are not linked by less than thethreshold number of degrees of separation. The interface includes aninterface element that allows the intended recipient to indicate thatthe communication should be displayed.

Implementations may include one or more of the following features. Forexample, the interface may inform the intended recipient that the senderhas sent a communication to the intended recipient. The interface maydisplay to the intended recipient an identifier of the sender. Thecommunication may be displayed when the intended recipient uses theinterface element to indicate that the communication should bedisplayed.

Determining whether the sender and the intended recipient are linked byless than the threshold number of degrees of separation may includedetermining whether the sender and the intended recipient are linked byat least one intermediary entity. Determining whether the sender islinked to the intended recipient by at least one intermediary entity mayinclude accessing a contact list of the intended recipient to determineat least one contact on the contact list. Determining whether the senderand the intended recipient are linked by at least one intermediaryentity may include accessing a contact list of the intended recipient todetermine a first contact on the intended recipient's contact list; andaccessing a contact list of the first contact to determine a secondcontact on the first contact's contact list.

Accessing a contact list of the intended recipient may include accessinga contact list that contains communication identifiers related to adifferent type of communication than the communication from the senderto the intended recipient. Accessing a contact list of the intendedrecipient may include accessing a contact list that containscommunication identifiers related to the type of communication thatincludes the communication from the sender to the recipient.

The contact list of the intended recipient may include an address book,a buddy list, a personal phone book, or a white list. The communicationmay be an e-mail message, an instant message, an SMS message, or atelephone call.

Implementations of the described techniques may include hardware, amethod or process, or computer software on a computer-accessible medium.

The details of one or more implementations are set forth in theaccompanying drawings and the description below. Other features will beapparent from the description and drawings, and from the claims.

DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing an exemplary networked computing environmentthat supports e-mail communications and in which spam filtering may beperformed.

FIG. 2 is an illustration showing an exemplary address book that may bedisplayed to a user of an e-mail client program.

FIG. 3 is an illustration showing an interface that allows an e-mailclient program user to add contacts to a white list.

FIG. 4 is a flow chart of a process for using an e-mail sender's degreesof separation from a mail recipient to aid in spam filtering.

FIG. 5 is a flow chart of an alternate process for using a sender'sdegrees of separation from a mail recipient to aid in spam filtering.

FIG. 6 is an illustration showing an exemplary interface that may beused to allow a user to adjust preferences with regard to the degrees ofseparation feature.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

In general, the degree of separation between a sender and an intendedrecipient is used to inform filtering of a communication sent from thesender to the intended recipient. The degree of separation between twoentities describes a relationship between those entities. Typically,user contact lists (e.g., address book, buddy list, and/or white list)are evaluated to determine the number of degrees (or hops) that arerequired to link or relate two users.

For example, recipient A may list user B in recipient A's address book,user B may list user C in user B's address book, and user C may listsender D in user C's address book. Here, sender D is linked to recipientA by two degrees of separation (with user B as the first degree and userC as the second degree). Recipient A is related to user C by one degreeof separation (user B) and user B is separated from sender D by onedegree of separation (user C). Recipient A and user B, users B and C,and user C and sender D are each respectively separated by zero degreesof separation.

The connectedness or lack of connectedness is used, possibly along withthe degrees of separation, to aid the handling of communications sent tothe recipient by the sender. For instance, handling may be informedbased on: (1) whether a sender and a recipient are connected (i.e., thesender and the recipient are known to each other or the sender is knownto the recipient); and (2) if they are connected, the number of degrees,hops or intermediaries required to link or relate the sender to therecipient.

The following description more fully describes these techniques asapplied to e-mail spam filtering. However, the techniques may be appliedto other communication media and to other filtering applications.

FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary networked computing environment 100 thatsupports e-mail communications and in which spam filtering may beperformed. Computer users are distributed geographically and communicateusing client systems 110 a and 110 b. Client systems 110 a and 110 b areconnected to Internet service provider (ISP) networks 120 a and 120 b,respectively. Clients 110 a and 110 b may be connected to the respectiveISP networks 120 a and 120 b through various communication channels suchas a modem connected to a telephone line (using, for example, serialline internet protocol (SLIP) or point-to-point protocol (PPP)) or adirect network connection (using, for example, transmission controlprotocol/internet protocol (TCP/IP)). E-mail servers 130 a and 130 balso are connected to ISP networks 120 a and 120 b, respectively. ISPnetworks 120 a and 120 b are connected to a global network 140 (e.g.,the Internet) such that a device on one ISP network 120 a or 120 b cancommunicate with a device on the other ISP network 120 a or 120 b. Forsimplicity, only two ISP networks 120 a and 120 b have been illustratedas connected to Internet 140. However, there may be a large number ofsuch ISP networks connected to Internet 140. Likewise, many e-mailservers and many client systems may be connected to each ISP network.

Each of the client systems 110 a and 110 b and the e-mail servers 130 aand 130 b may be implemented using, for example, a general-purposecomputer capable of responding to and executing instructions in adefined manner, a personal computer, a special-purpose computer, aworkstation, a server, a device, a component, or other equipment or somecombination thereof capable of responding to and executing instructions.Client systems 110 a and 110 b and e-mail servers 130 a and 130 b mayreceive instructions from, for example, a software application, aprogram, a piece of code, a device, a computer, a computer system, or acombination thereof, which independently or collectively directoperations. These instructions may take the form of one or morecommunications programs that facilitate communications between the usersof client systems 110 a and 110 b. Such communications programs mayinclude, for example, e-mail programs, IM programs, file transferprotocol (FTP) programs, or voice-over-IP (VoIP) programs. Theinstructions may be embodied permanently or temporarily in any type ofmachine, component, equipment, storage medium, or propagated signal thatis capable of being delivered to a client system 110 a and 110 b or thee-mail servers 130 a and 130 b.

Each of client systems 110 a and 110 b and e-mail servers 130 a and 130b includes a communications interface (not shown) used by thecommunications programs to send communications. The communications mayinclude e-mail, audio data, video data, general binary data, or textdata (e.g., data encoded in American Standard Code for InformationInterchange (ASCII) format).

Examples of ISP networks 120 a and 120 b include Wide Area Networks(WANs), Local Area Networks (LANs), analog or digital wired and wirelesstelephone networks (e.g., a Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN), anIntegrated Services Digital Network (ISDN), or a Digital Subscriber Line(xDSL)), or any other wired or wireless network. Networks 120 a and 120b may include multiple networks or subnetworks, each of which mayinclude, for example, a wired or wireless data pathway.

Each of e-mail servers 130 a and 130 b may handle e-mail for thousandsor more e-mail users connected to an ISP network 120 a or 120 b. Eache-mail server may handle e-mail for a single e-mail domain (e.g.,aol.com) or for multiple e-mail domains. In addition, each e-mail servermay be composed of multiple, interconnected computers working togetherto provide e-mail service for e-mail users of the corresponding ISPnetwork.

An e-mail user, such as a user of client system 110 a or 110 b,typically has one or more e-mail accounts on an e-mail server 130 a or130 b. Each account corresponds to an e-mail address. Each account(otherwise referred to as a user mailbox) may have one or more foldersin which e-mail is stored. E-mail sent to one of the e-mail user'se-mail addresses is routed to the corresponding e-mail server 130 a or130 b and placed in the account that corresponds to the e-mail addressto which the e-mail was sent. The e-mail user then uses, for example, ane-mail client program executing on client system 110 a or 110 b toretrieve the e-mail from e-mail server 130 a or 130 b and view thee-mail. The e-mail client program may be, for example, a web browser (inthe case of HTML mail), a stand-alone e-mail program, or an e-mailprogram that is part of an integrated suite of applications.

The e-mail client programs executing on client systems 110 a and 110 balso may allow one of the users to send e-mail to an e-mail address. Forexample, the e-mail client program executing on client system 110 a mayallow the e-mail user of client system 110 a (the sender) to compose ane-mail message and address the message to a recipient address, such asan e-mail address of the user of client system 110 b. When the senderindicates the e-mail is to be sent to the recipient address, the e-mailclient program executing on client system 110 a communicates with e-mailserver 130 a to handle the sending of the e-mail to the recipientaddress. For an e-mail addressed to an e-mail user of client system 110b, for example, e-mail server 130 a sends the e-mail to e-mail server130 b. E-mail server 130 b receives the e-mail and places the e-mail inthe account that corresponds to the recipient address. The user ofclient system 110 b may then retrieve the e-mail from e-mail server 130b, as described above.

To aid a user in sending e-mails, many e-mail client programs or otherprograms allow a user to maintain an address book. An address book is alist of the user's contacts along with their contact information. Anaddress book may contain a contact's e-mail address, instant messagingscreenname, street address, and/or telephone number(s). The address bookmay be stored on the client system or on a server, and may be accessedby the client program.

FIG. 2 illustrates an exemplary address book 200 that may be displayedto a user of an e-mail client program. Address book 200 includes a listbox 210 that contains a list 215 of the user's contacts. Only a singlecontact, John Smith, is shown in contact list 215, though a contact listmay contain multiple entries. When a contact in contact list 215 isselected, the contact's information 225 is shown in a box 220. Theinformation contains, for example, the contact's name, the contact'sscreenname, and the contact's e-mail address.

In an e-mail environment such as that shown in FIG. 1, a spammertypically uses an e-mail client program to send similar spam e-mails tohundreds, if not thousands, of e-mail recipients. For example, a spammermay target hundreds of recipient e-mail addresses serviced by e-mailserver 130 b on ISP network 120 b, and may maintain the list of targetedrecipient addresses as a distribution list. The spammer may use thee-mail client program to compose a spam e-mail and may instruct thee-mail client program to use the distribution list to send the spame-mail to the recipient addresses. The e-mail then is sent to e-mailserver 130 h for delivery to the recipient addresses.

Filtering traditionally has been used to eliminate or at least reducesome spam e-mail. Filtering may be done on the server-side, e.g. ate-mail server 130 b, or on the client-side, e.g. at client 110 b. Thus,a spam filter may be located on the server or the client. Whereverlocated, the spam filter may analyze e-mail coming into the server orclient to determine whether any of the e-mail is spam. Once the filterdesignates a piece of e-mail as spam, the e-mail is treated accordingly.For example, the spam e-mail may be deleted or placed in a specific spamfolder.

A spam filter may be implemented using a number of techniques. Onetechnique that has been used is simple text filtering, in which ane-mail's headers and/or the e-mail body is searched for simple textstrings or regular expressions and the e-mail is classified as spambased on whether the string or expression is present. Other techniquesanalyze word or other features of an e-mail to develop a rating orprobability measure of the likelihood that the e-mail is spam, and thencompare the rating or measure to a classification threshold. If therating or measure exceeds the threshold, the e-mail is designated asspam. The techniques used to develop the ratings may be, for example,heuristic or Bayesian based.

The spam filter also may employ so-called white lists and/or blacklists. A black list is a list of e-mail domains, specific e-mailaddresses, or IP addresses that are considered to be a source of spam.Any e-mail received from a blacklisted domain, e-mail address or IPaddress is designated by the filter as spam.

A white list typically is used to help ensure that legitimate e-mail isdelivered to the recipient. Similar to a black list, a white list is alist of e-mail domains, specific e-mail addresses, or IP addresses. Theitems on a white list, however, generally are considered to be sourcesof legitimate e-mail. Consequently, any e-mail received from a source onthe white list is designated as legitimate e-mail (i.e., non-spam) andexempted from further filtering.

FIG. 3 illustrates an interface 300 that allows an e-mail client programuser to add contacts to a white list. Interface 300 includes a list box310 that contains a list of contacts 315. Interface 300 also includes anedit box 320 and “Add” button 330 for adding additional contacts to list315. A radio button 340 is included in interface 300 to allow the userto designate list 315 as a white list (i.e. to allow e-mail from thelisted contacts to be delivered without being subjected to spamfiltering).

An e-mail sender's degree of separation from a mail recipient also maybe used to aid in spam filtering. The “degree of separation” representsa metric used to quantify whether/how the recipient is linked to thesender through intermediary people or other entities. For example, arecipient may know a first user (first degree of separation) and thefirst user may know a second user (second degree of separation) whoknows the sender of an e-mail. In this case, the sender is separatedfrom the recipient by two degrees of separation (i.e., by twointermediate contacts). A level of “trust” or “legitimacy” about asender's communication can be inferred by looking at whether the senderis linked to a recipient through the recipient's contacts, therecipient's contacts' contacts, or otherwise, with the level of trusttypically diminishing as the number of degrees of separation increases.For instance, a system or user may consider a communication based onmore degrees of separation between the sender and recipient as lesslikely to be legitimate or trusted than one with fewer degrees ofseparation.

A trusted list of contacts linked to a user/recipient may be developedfor use with a spam filter when filtering. The trusted list may bedeveloped, for example, by evaluating a contact list for the intendedrecipient that lists the intended recipient's contacts as more fullydescribed below. The contact list may contain communication identifiersrelated to the type of communication that is received (e.g., a buddylist may be accessed when the type of communication is an instantmessage, while an address book may be referenced when the type ofcommunication being filtered is an e-mail communication or telephonecall), or the contact list may contain communication identifiers relatedto a different type of communication than the one that is sent (e.g., abuddy list may be accessed when the communication is an e-mail), or acombination of similar and different types of contact lists may beaccessed. Further, a single contact list may have both communicationidentifiers related to the type of communication received andcommunication identifiers related to a different type of communicationthan the one received. Whether a contact is linked to an intendedrecipient may be based on communication identifiers related to the typeof communication received or may be based on communication identifiersrelated to a different type of communication than the one received.

Thus, for example, a contact may be determined as linked to an intendedrecipient based on an IM screen names. This contact, however, may beplaced in a trusted list that is used for e-mail communications. Inother words, a contact may be determined to be linked to the intendedrecipient based on one type of communication, and this link is used forother types of communications. The link based on IM screen names may bedetermined, for instance, by accessing a buddy list of the intendedrecipient or by accessing a central contact list that contains e-mailaddresses and IM screen names.

The trusted list may simply contain a communication identifier (e.g.,e-mail address or screenname) for the linked contacts, or the trustedlist also may contain the degrees of separation between the user and thelinked contacts, depending on how the trusted list is used to facilitatespam filtering. The trusted list also may contain other informationabout a linked contact. The following is an example of a trusted listthat contains a communication identifier and the degrees of separationfor each linked contact:

Trusted List Screennames Degrees of Separation randomcontact 2 Jsmith 3internetann 1 chattinchuck 4

Depending on the spam filtering techniques employed by the spam filter,the trusted list may be used simply as a white list to exempt from spamfiltering those e-mails from the linked contacts. Similarly, the trustedlist may be used simply as a white list to allow only communicationsfrom those entities on the white list to be delivered to the intendedrecipient, with all other communications being prevented from reachingthe intended recipient.

Alternatively, the presence or absence of a sender on the trusted list(and possibly the sender's degrees of separation) may be considered afeature of an e-mail when determining whether the e-mail is spam. Forexample, for a spam filter that heuristically develops a rating of thelikelihood that an e-mail is spam, the presence in the trusted list maydecrease the rating, with lower degrees of separation decreasing therating more than higher degrees of separation. For a Bayesian spamfilter, the presence or absence on the trusted list, along with thedegrees of separation, may be considered a feature for both training andclassification. The degrees of separation may be used with otherfeatures of the e-mail to determine a spam rating. The other featuresmay include, for example, origin IP address, origin domain, mime-typescontained in the e-mail, sender's address, and specific words in thebody of the e-mail.

Alternatively, or additionally, e-mail may be treated differently basedon the sender's degrees of separation. For example, e-mail whose senderis within 1 to M degrees of separation may be exempted from filtering,e-mail whose sender is within M+1 to M+X degrees of separation may betreated as unknown and consequently filtered, and e-mail whose sender isnot linked or is linked by a degree of separation greater than M+X maybe automatically discarded as spam. Other ways of treating the e-mailare possible, as are other ways of dividing up the relevant degrees ofseparation.

FIG. 4 is a flow chart of a process 400 for using an e-mail sender'sdegrees of separation from a mail recipient to aid in spam filtering. Alist of contacts is maintained for the recipient (410). The list ofcontacts may be any personally maintained list, for example, an addressbook, a buddy list for instant messaging, and/or a white list. The restof process 400 will be described using an address book as an example ofa list of contacts.

The contacts in the recipient's address book are added to a trusted listof the recipient (420). If the trusted list contains, for example,e-mail addresses, but the contact list only contains screennames, thenthe contacts' e-mail addresses may be looked-up using, for example, adatabase that correlates information such as a user's e-mail address andIM screennames.

Next, the contacts linked to the recipient (i.e., up to a desired degreeof separation) are identified and added to the trusted list. To do so,the address books of each contact in the recipient's address book areaccessed (430). The contacts in the recipient's contacts' address books(i.e., the contacts separated by one degree) then are added to thetrusted list (440). If another degree of separation is desired (450),the degree of separation is incremented (460) such that the addressbooks of the contacts that are separated from the recipient by onedegree are accessed (430) and the contacts in those address books areadded to the trusted list (440). When a contact is added to the trustedlist, the contact's degree of separation from the recipient also may beadded. The addition of contacts continues until the desired degree ofseparation is reached (450). Once the desired degree of separation hasbeen reached, the trusted list is input to the spam filter for use infiltering spam (470).

Process 400 may be performed before an e-mail is received and thetrusted list may be stored for use with the spam filter. Alternatively,process 400 may be performed whenever an e-mail is received.

Process 400 may result in the trusted list not being updated when anyusers related to the intended recipient update their contact lists. Thatis, if a user related to the intended recipient adds a contact to theuser's contact list, the new contact may not be reflected in theintended recipient's trusted list. This situation may not be overlydetrimental, particularly in implementations where the trusted list isused as a white list to exempt certain e-mails from spam filtering.However, repeating process 400 on a periodic or aperiodic basis maymitigate this situation. Another manner of mitigating this situation isto use an update system in which changes to contact lists are trackedand trusted lists are updated accordingly in an incremental fashion orby triggering an update or re-initiation of process 400 when an updateoccurs. The alternate process 500 illustrated in FIG. 5 also maymitigate such a situation.

FIG. 5 is a flow chart of an alternate process 500 for using a sender'sdegrees of separation from a mail recipient to aid in spam filtering.When an e-mail is received (510), the sender's address is retrieved fromthe e-mail (520). A search then is performed to determine the sender'sdegree of separation from the recipient (530). In one implementation, toperform the search, the contacts in the recipient's address book (i.e.,the contacts separated by zero degrees) are searched to determine if thesender is among those contacts. If not, then the address books of one ormore contacts in the recipient's address book are accessed and searchedto determine if the sender is among those contacts. If the sender is notamong those contacts, and another degree of separation is desired, thedegree of separation is incremented such that the address books of thecontacts that are separated from the recipient by one degree areaccessed and searched to determine if the sender is among thosecontacts. This continues until the desired degree of separation has beenreached. At that point, if the sender has not been located, then thesender is not considered to be linked to the recipient. An indication ofwhether the sender is linked to the intended recipient, and possiblyalso the sender's degree of separation from the intended recipient, areinput to a spam filter for use in determining whether the e-mail is spam(540).

Process 400 or process 500 may be implemented by the server, by theclient, or by a combination of both.

The contact lists of the users may be stored centrally or in adistributed fashion. For example, the techniques may be applied to anenvironment in which all of the users' contact lists are stored on asingle server (completely centralized), or on a single cluster ofservers owned by the same e-mail service provider (partiallycentralized/distributed).

The contact lists may be stored in a more fully distributed fashion bybeing stored on different servers owned by different e-mail serviceproviders (which may or may not adopt a standardized protocol forsharing information such as contact lists), or by being stored on eachclient system (i.e., each user's contact list is stored on the user'sclient system). If the contact lists are stored on the client (e.g., aclient running Microsoft Outlook), the accessing and searching of thecontacts' address books or other contact lists may be performed usingpeer-to-peer techniques. When contact lists are stored on the clients,privacy and security measures may be implemented, such as hashing thetrusted list or otherwise making it unreadable to the user, so that theuser can not determine who is listed in his or her contacts' lists orotherwise have access to someone's contact information that has not beenspecifically given to the user. For example, if a recipient has only onecontact in his or her contact list and only one degree of separation isused, then the recipient may be able to discern who that single contacthas on his or her contact list. Making the trusted list unreadable toits “owner” may eliminate this potential issue.

In a distributed environment in which different contact lists aremaintained on servers of different providers, a trusted group model maybe implemented to allow access to the different contact lists, asneeded, to develop the degrees of separation between a recipient and asender. For example, if the user of client system 110 b has an accounton e-mail server 130 b and the user's address book is maintained onserver 130 b, the user's address book (or the user's contacts' addressbooks) may include contacts with address books maintained on a serverowned by a different provider, such as, for example, server 130 a.Generally, the provider of server 130 a would not allow outside partiesto access the contact lists of its users. To implement the foregoingtechniques, however, a trusted group model may be developed that allowsserver 130 b to access the address books or other contact lists of theusers whose accounts are maintained on server 130 a. In this way, server130 b may be able to determine the linked contacts, even if some of thecontact lists are on server 130 a. Thus, for instance, e-mail serviceproviders such as America Online (AOL) and Hotmail may cooperate toallow access to users' contact lists so as to increase the effectivenessof the foregoing techniques. Also, for example, two corporations, eachrunning an e-mail server (e.g., a Microsoft Exchange server), acorporation and an ISP, or any two e-mail service providers maycooperate to allow access to users' contact lists.

Regardless of whether a client-side or server-side implementation isused, for some implementations the foregoing techniques may be limitedout of privacy or security concerns similar to those described abovewith regard to storing the contact lists at the client. For example, ifa recipient has only one contact in his or her contact list and only onedegree of separation is used, then the recipient may be able to discernwho that single contact has on his or her contact list if restrictionsare not applied.

The use of the foregoing techniques may be limited such that thetechniques are not performed when the number of contacts in arecipient's contact list is below a predetermined number. Also, theremay be a requirement that a minimum number of degrees of separation aresearched. Other limitations may include limiting a user's ability toperceive his or her trusted list. Preventing the user's ability toperceive or access the trusted list may be accomplished by preventingthe display of the trusted list, storing the trusted list remote fromthe user, or, as described above, storing the trusted list as a hash.

The foregoing techniques also may be limited such that a contact list isnot used when the contact list does not contain the recipient. In otherwords: the contact lists of users who do not include the recipient arenot used to determine contacts at the next level of separation. Forexample, if user A is a mail recipient, a user B that is in user A'saddress book may be indicated as a linked user. When user B's addressbook contains user A, user B's address book is used for the next degreeof separation, which results in a user C (who is in user B's addressbook) as being linked to user A. However, because user C's address bookdoes not contain user A, user C's address book is not used when a searchis done for the next degree of separation.

The techniques are described as being applied to e-mail spam filtering.However, the techniques may be used for spam filtering of communicationsin other communication media, including both text and non-text media.For example, the techniques may be applied to instant messaging. In suchan environment, an instant messaging buddy list or an address book maybe used as the contact list, and the trusted list may contain thescreennames of linked contacts. The trusted list may be input into aspam filter that prevents spam instant messages. Another example of anenvironment in which the foregoing techniques may be implemented isshort messaging service (SMS) communications used in cell phones. Inthis case, a phone book for the cell phone may be used as the contactlist. As another example, these techniques may be used to filtertelephone calls based on a user's contact list, such as a personal phonebook or an address book, particularly if the telephone calls are carriedover packet networks such as the Internet.

The above techniques also may be extended to apply to the generalhandling, classification, or filtering of communications. For example, arecipient may want messages from senders who are linked to the recipientto be classified as important, while other messages are classified aslow priority. Similarly, a Bayesian classifier may be used to classifyreceived e-mail into classes other than spam. The Bayesian classifiermay be trained with a set of e-mail that includes information aboutwhether a sender of the e-mail is linked to the recipient and, if so, byhow many degrees. The Bayesian classifier then may use the informationwhen classifying an unknown e-mail.

As another example of general handling of communications, the handlingin an instant messaging implementation (or other implementations) mayinclude bypassing or invoking a “knock-knock” interface. At times, whena sender sends an intended recipient an instant message, instead ofreceiving the instant message right away, the intended recipient'sinstant messaging program invokes a “knock-knock” interface. Theinterface typically informs the intended recipient that the sender istrying to instant message him or her, identifies the sender (e.g., bydisplaying the screen name of the sender), and provides the intendedrecipient with an option of accepting the message. If the intendedrecipient indicates that he or she wishes to accept the instant message,it is delivered to the intended recipient and displayed to the intendedrecipient. On the other hand, if the intended recipient indicates he orshe would not like to receive the message, the message is not providedto the intended recipient and, for example, may be discarded. In someimplementations, the sender also is placed on a block list when theintended recipient indicates he or she does not want to receive aninstant message from the sender. The block list is used to preventfurther instant message communications from users on the block listwithout bothering the intended recipient, i.e., instant messages fromusers on the block list are automatically ignored without asking theintended recipient whether he or she wants to receive them.

The trusted list may be used to determine when to invoke a knock-knockinterface. To do so, whether a knock-knock interface is invoked maydepend on the number of degrees of separation between the sender and theintended recipient. In one implementation, instant messages from sendersless than or equal to n degrees away from the intended recipient areprovided to the intended recipient automatically without a knock-knockinterface being invoked, while a knock-knock interface is invoked forinstant messages from senders greater than n degrees away from theintended recipient. Alternatively, instant messages from senders within1 to M degrees may be provided to the intended recipient without aknock-knock interface being invoked, instant messages from senderswithin M+1 to N degrees may cause a knock-knock to be invoked, whileinstant messages from senders greater than N degrees away may beautomatically discarded without invoking a knock-knock interface orotherwise informing the intended recipient.

The above techniques have been described as creating a “trusted” list.However, these techniques could be used to source a “non-trusted” listby adding the black lists (or other lists denoting untrusted senders) oflinked contacts to a non-trusted list for the intended recipient, atleast up to a threshold degree of separation. The non-trusted list maythen, for example, be used as a black list, or may be a factor for spamfiltering.

Creating such a non-trusted list may be used in conjunction withdeveloping the trusted list. For example, for each or a subset of thecontacts added to the trusted list, the entities on the added contacts'black lists (or other lists denoting untrusted senders) can be placed onthe intended recipient's non-trusted list. As another example, when acontact's contact list is accessed and added to the trusted list, thecontact's list of untrusted senders also may be accessed and added tothe non-trusted list.

FIG. 6 illustrates an exemplary interface 600 that may be used to allowa user to adjust preferences with regard to the degrees of separationfeature. Some implementations may provide a user the ability to decidewhether degrees of separation will be used, and, if so, how many degreesshould be used. Exemplary interface 600 includes a text 605 thatexplains to the user that the user may decide to have his or her whitelist populated using degrees of separation and that the user may selecthow many degrees to use. Text 605 includes a hyperlinked portion 610that, when selected by the user, invokes an interface (not shown) thatprovides information about degrees of separation.

Interface 600 also has a check box 615 that allows a user to selectwhether degrees of separation should be used to develop his or her whitelist. When check box 615 is not checked, degrees of separation will notbe used. When check box 615 is checked, degrees of separation will beused.

Interface 600 additionally has an edit box 620 that allows a user toselect how many degrees will be used to develop the white list. Whencheck box 615 is not checked, edit box 620 becomes inactive and isgrayed out. When check box 615 is checked, however, edit box 620 becomesactive and the user is able to enter the number of degrees to be used.

An OK button 625 is available on interface 600 to allow the user toindicate that the preferences selected in interface 600 should be saved.A Cancel button 630 cancels the preferences without saving them.

Other implementations may provide varying levels of user control. Forinstance, the user may be able to select whether white lists (or othertrusted lists) are used, but without any control over whether degrees ofseparation are used. That is, the system may automatically use degreesof separation when the user chooses to use white lists or other trustedlists. Alternatively, for example, a system may use the white lists orother trusted lists and degrees of separation without providing the usercontrol over either.

The techniques described above are not limited to any particularhardware or software configuration. Rather, they may be implementedusing hardware, software, or a combination of both. The methods andprocesses described may be implemented as computer programs that areexecuted on programmable computers comprising at least one processor andat least one data storage system. The programs may be implemented in ahigh-level programming language and may also be implemented in assemblyor other lower level languages, if desired.

Any such program will typically be stored on a computer-usable storagemedium or device (e.g., CD-Rom, RAM, or magnetic disk). When read intothe processor of the computer and executed, the instructions of theprogram cause the programmable computer to carry out the variousoperations described above.

A number of implementations have been described. Nevertheless, it willbe understood that various modifications may be made. Accordingly, otherimplementations are within the scope of the following claims.

1. A computer-implemented method comprising: receiving a communicationfrom a sender, wherein the communication is directed to an intendedrecipient; identifying the sender of the communication; identifying theintended recipient of the communication; accessing a contact listassociated with the intended recipient, the contact list of the intendedrecipient identifying at least one user identifier; accessing a contactlist associated with the at least one user identifier; determining,based on the contact list of the intended recipient and the contact listof the user identifier, whether the sender and the intended recipientare linked by less than a threshold number of degrees of separation; anddisplaying an interface to the intended recipient, prior to displayingthe communication to the intended recipient, when the sender and theintended recipient are not linked by less than the threshold number ofdegrees of separation.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein the interfaceinforms the intended recipient that the sender has sent a communicationto the intended recipient.
 3. The method of claim 1, wherein theinterface comprises an interface element that allows the intendedrecipient to indicate that the communication should be displayed.
 4. Themethod of claim 1, wherein determining whether the sender and theintended recipient are linked by less than the threshold number ofdegrees of separation includes determining whether the sender and theintended recipient are linked by at least one intermediary entity. 5.The method of claim 1, further comprising displaying the communicationto the intended recipient when the sender and the intended recipient arelinked by less than the threshold number of degrees of separation. 6.The method of claim 1, wherein the contact list of the intendedrecipient comprises at least one of an address book, a buddy list, apersonal phone book, and a white list.
 7. The method of claim 1, whereinthe communication is one of an e-mail message, an instant message, anSMS message, and a telephone call.
 8. The method of claim 1, furthercomprising displaying the communication to the intended recipient whenthe threshold number of degrees of separation corresponds to a value ofat least one and the contact list of the user identifier includes anidentifier of the sender.
 9. The method of claim 1, wherein theinterface is displayed to the intended recipient when the thresholdnumber of degrees of separation corresponds to a value of at least twoand an identifier of the sender is not included in the contact list ofthe intended recipient and the contact list of the user identifier. 10.A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing a programmableinstructions, which when executed on a processor, causes the processorto perform a method comprising: receiving a communication from a sender,wherein the communication is directed to an intended recipient;identifying the sender of the communication; identifying the intendedrecipient of the communication; accessing a contact list associated withthe intended recipient, the contact list of the intended recipientidentifying at least one user identifier; accessing a contact listassociated with the at least one user identifier; determining, based onthe contact list of the intended recipient and the contact list of theuser identifier, whether the sender and the intended recipient arelinked by less than a threshold number of degrees of separation; anddisplaying an interface to the intended recipient, prior to displayingthe communication to the intended recipient, when the sender and theintended recipient are not linked by less than the threshold number ofdegrees of separation.
 11. The non-transitory computer-readable storagemedium of claim 10, further comprising displaying the communication tothe intended recipient when the threshold number of degrees ofseparation corresponds to a value of at least one and the contact listof the user identifier includes an identifier of the sender.
 12. Thenon-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 10, wherein theinterface is displayed to the intended recipient when the thresholdnumber of degrees of separation corresponds to a value of at least twoand an identifier of the sender is not included in the contact list ofthe intended recipient and the contact list of the user identifier. 13.The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 10, whereinthe interface comprises an interface element that allows the intendedrecipient to indicate that the communication should be displayed. 14.The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 10, furthercomprising displaying the communication to the intended recipient whenthe sender and the intended recipient are linked by less than thethreshold number of degrees of separation.
 15. The non-transitorycomputer-readable storage medium of claim 10, wherein the contact listof the intended recipient comprises at least one of an address book, abuddy list, a personal phone book, and a white list.
 16. Thenon-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 10, wherein thecommunication is one of an e-mail message, an instant message, an SMSmessage, and a telephone call.
 17. An apparatus comprising: a memorydevice storing instructions; a processor executing the instructions to:receive a communication from a sender, wherein the communication isdirected to an intended recipient; identify the sender of thecommunication; identify the intended recipient of the communication;access a contact list associated with the intended recipient, thecontact list of the intended recipient identifying at least one useridentifier; access a contact list associated with the at least one useridentifier; and determine, based on the contact list of the intendedrecipient and the contact list of the user identifier, whether thesender and the intended recipient are linked by less than a thresholdnumber of degrees of separation; and a display device displaying aninterface to the intended recipient, prior to displaying thecommunication to the intended recipient, when the sender and theintended recipient are not linked by less than the threshold number ofdegrees of separation.
 18. The apparatus of claim 17, wherein thecommunication is displayed to the intended recipient when the thresholdnumber of degrees of separation corresponds to a value of at least oneand the contact list of the user identifier includes an identifier ofthe sender.
 19. The apparatus of claim 17, wherein the interface isdisplayed to the intended recipient when the threshold number of degreesof separation corresponds to a value of at least two and an identifierof the sender is not included in the contact list of the intendedrecipient and the contact list of the user identifier.
 20. The apparatusof claim 17, wherein the communication is displayed to the intendedrecipient when the sender and the intended recipient are linked by lessthan the threshold number of degrees of separation.